Saturday night was a special one for the Kentucky Wildcats as they defeated the South Carolina Gamecocks.
It was a game full of good, but there was some bad and even ugly to come from it. Let's take a look:
The Good
WINNING
This was truly a program-building win for Kentucky football as they continue their climb up the SEC hierarchy while gaining national respect. That's because UK ended a five-year drought of no true road wins while also winning their first SEC road win since 2009 after beating the Gamecocks.
As far as UK had fallen under Joker Phillips, Mark Stoops has pulled this program out of the grave in an amazing amount of time in just his third year as a college head coach. Stoops said Kentucky was a sleeping giant when he came here, and at the rate the program is going, he may end up being right.
Denzel Ware
South Carolina had a chance to tie on a two-point conversion midway through the fourth quarter, but Pharoh Cooper fumbled and Denzel Ware returned the ball 98 yards to give Kentucky two points and what proved to be the final margin. Prior to that, SC had all of the momentum and looked poised to score a comeback win in similar fashion as to what UK did to the Gamecocks a year ago.
This was just one of many big plays that Wildcat freshmen made in this game, but Ware's two-point score may have been the biggest of them all.His play swung momentum back in favor of the Cats as they were able to hold on for the monumental win.
Must Reads
BOOM
Boom Williams carried the rock 14 times for 107 yards against the Gamecocks as the sophomore RB was offensive MVP of this game. He's now rushed for over 100 yards in three consecutive games, making him the first UK player with 100 yards rushing in three consecutive since Derrick Locke had four straight 100 yard games in 2010.
Jojo Mojo vs Gamecocks
Jojo Kemp owns South Carolina. In three career games vs, the Gamecocks, the junior RB has 250 yards and four scores after he rushed for 78 yards and a TD Saturday night. all three of those games have come down to the wire with UK going 2-1 in them.
Kemp also reminded us that he's not going away anytime soon, despite RB being arguably the best position on the roster with Boom, Mikel Horton and now Sihiem King toting the rock. Kemp absolutely deserves to keep getting at least 10+ touches per game going forward.
The Bad
Mikel Horton
Speaking of, the Cats lost Mikel Horton to a neck injury he suffered in the first half, leaving UK without their best short-yardage back for the rest of the night. Anytime the neck is involved, it's a scary situation, especially when said player doesn't return.
The good news is Horton is still on the depth chart released Monday, so it appears it wasn't serious enough to cost him his season or, God forbid, his career. The fact that it was bad enough to keep him out most of this game doesn't bode well for his status vs. Florida this week.
Another 2nd Half Mini-Meltdown
In Kentucky's first two games, they've outscored South Carolina and Louisiana-Lafayette 48-14 in the first half. Both games should have been effectively over at halftime, but the Cats nearly collapsed in both games.
Against ULL, UK allowed the Ragin Cajuns to go on a 24-0 run before UK scored a late touchdown to escape with the 40-33 win.
Saturday night saw a similar scenario as UK allowed SC to score 16 unanswered points before Ware's two-pointer helped UK escape with the win. Though the Cats are 2-0, they're simply not going to reach their true potential this year, whatever that is, if they keep letting their foots off the gas in the second half.
Chris Westry's fumble?
UK got a game-changing play from Chris Westry when picked off Perry Orth on what turned out to be SC's final offensive possession. However, as soon as Westry caught the ball, he was immediately tackled from behind by Deebo Samuel and stripped of the ball.
The ref initially ruled Westry was down, and after reviewing it, ruled that the play on the field stood. UK dodged a major bullet as you could have made a good argument the ball was moving as Westry hit the ground before the ball popped out and an SC player clearly recovered it.
I'll be honest: I think Westry fumbled the ball, and I would have felt UK got cheated had it been the other way around. The Cats caught a break here, and it's not like they've never been victims of a bad call.
Still, put that ball away Westry and get down. We don't need another Marty Moore gaffe costing the Cats a close game.
The Ugly
The First Drive
Kentucky got off to about as ugly of an offensive start as they could have on their first drive. After the Gamecocks punted on their first possession and downed the ball at the 2-yard line, Shannon Dawson called a great play that saw Patrick Towles hit a wide-open Dorian Baker cutting across the middle for what appeared to be huge gain...
But Baker flat-out dropped it. He couldn't have been more open and probably would have gained big yardage after the catch. After a Boom Williams was stuffed on 2nd down, The Gamecocks pass-rushers were able to pin their ears back and rush hard on 3rd-and-long with UK standing at their own goal line. That forced an errant pass from Towels as he was hit that Skai Moore picked off and returned down to the 2-yard line.
One play later, Connor Mitch faked a handoff and ran it into the end zone untouched to give the Gamecocks a 7-0 lead. The game got a lot prettier afterwards, but this was still a disastrous start that will cost UK games against better opponents.
Connor Mitch
During the first half, South Carolina QB Connor Mitch was knocked out of the game with a shoulder injury. It turned out to be a separated shoulder that could end the first-year starter's season after just two games.
While we obviously want to see UK win, you never want to see someone injured seriously in a game. You especially hate to see a guy lose his chance to start because of an injury. Hopefully, Mitch is able to recover and get back on the field in a starting role again.